Dahdaleh Global Health Graduate Scholar, Faculty of Environmental and Urban Change
Graduate Student Scholar

Brian Waters is pursuing a PhD in geography at the Faculty of Environment and Urban Change. He works at the nexus of water security, management, and governance in the informal settlements of Freetown, Sierra Leone. First (water security), he seeks to thoroughly understand the everyday "water lives" of people, what they consider and do to access water, and what barriers hold them back. Second (water management), he researches the values and decisions of those who control access to water. Third (water governance), he investigates how outside interventions affect the incentives and practices of water managers and gatherers.
Brian's research is conducted from the perspectives of Feminist Geography and Political Ecology. He strives to enhance the "user interface" of water security throughout the global south by integrating technology, mixed methods research, and political insights within a framework of human socio-design and systems thinking.
His current roles include:
- Dahdaleh Global Health Graduate Scholar
- CITY Institute Graduate Student Representative
- OneWATER Student Chapter Coordinator
- Harriet Tubman Institute Graduate Research Associate
Themes | Global Health & Humanitarianism |
Status | Alum |
Events |
5th Annual Global Health Graduate Scholars Symposium Decentralized Water Markets and Seasonality in Freetown, Sierra Leone, with Brian Waters |
Related Work |
N/A
|
Updates |
No Health Without Water: Wrapping Up a Year of Fieldwork in Freetown | October 2, 2026
York University PhD Researcher Completes Nearly Half a Year of Water Justice Data Collection in Freetown, Sierra Leone | March 23, 2026 2025 Year in Review | December 18, 2025 Seventeen Exceptional Scholars Awarded 2025-2026 Dahdaleh Global Health Graduate Scholarships | September 2, 2025 Recap — Fifth Annual Dahdaleh Global Health Graduate Scholars Symposium | January 23, 2025 2024 Year in Review | December 19, 2024 Nineteen Exceptional Scholars Awarded 2024-2025 Dahdaleh Global Health Graduate Scholarships | August 29, 2024 Recap – Water Resource Management in Freetown, Sierra Leone | March 7, 2024 |
You may also be interested in...
Hot Off the Press – Modelling residual chlorine in humanitarian response in PLOS WATER
Research by Dahdaleh Global Health Graduate Scholar Michael De Santi (lead author) and his coauthors, including DI Research Fellow Syed Imran Ali and DI Faculty Fellow Usman Khan, has recently been published in PLOS WATER ...Read more about this Post
The Climate Collective: York’s First Climate-Focused Student Club
The climate crisis is not just a scientific issue. It’s emotional, cultural, and personal. At York University, a new kind of student response is taking shape: The Climate Collective (TCC). Founded by students in the ...Read more about this Post
Recap — Graduate Student-led Research on Probabilistic Modelling with Machine Learning for Safe Water Optimization
On September 7, 2022, Dahdaleh graduate student fellow in the Lassonde School of Engineering, Michael De Santi presented his work analyzing the technical aspects of machine learning used in the Safe Water Optimization Tool (SWOT) ...Read more about this Post
